Steven Evans: Songs for a Memorial
Overview
Comprising 12 text-based, polychromatic LED sculptures, Songs for a Memorial (2020–22) was a site-specific installation by artist Steven Evans designed to evoke the luminous glow of classic neon signage and the electric energy of nightlife. Installed throughout the New York City AIDS Memorial, the project layered vibrant color over the site’s granite architecture, exploring the intersection of popular music, language, and collective memory during the onset and peak of the AIDS epidemic.
Project Context & Curatorial Role
As Curator, I developed and directed the site-specific presentation with Steven Evans, coordinating the installation alongside production partners Lite Brite Neon to turn the Memorial into a glowing soundscape made visible.
Evans appropriated titles from dance, disco, synth-pop, and club tracks inextricably linked to the 1970s and 80s—including MFSB’s "Love Is the Message," Sylvester’s liberation anthem "You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)," and Bronski Beat’s protest track "Why." By weaving these titles together across the plaza, the work tapped into music's unique power to serve as an emotional container for an entire generation.
Rooted in Andrew Holleran's poignant observation that "any memory of those days is nothing but a string of songs," the sculptures held the complex, overlapping paradoxes at the heart of queer history: the simultaneous experience of profound grief and intense joy, loss and love, mourning and radical celebration.
Role: Curator
Date: May—September 2022
Location: New York City AIDS Memorial, New York, NY
Artist: Steven Evans
Production: Lite Brite Neon
Production: Lite Brite Neon; Photography: Celeste Godoy
